


The Tightrope Walkers

by Mab (Mab_Browne)



Category: The Sentinel
Genre: Episode: s04e08 The Sentinel by Blair Sandburg, M/M, Post-Canon, Sentinel Thursday
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-13
Updated: 2017-11-13
Packaged: 2019-02-01 17:29:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12709578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mab_Browne/pseuds/Mab
Summary: A short angsty scene post The Sentinel by Blair Sandburg.  The guys finally start talking. Just a little.





	The Tightrope Walkers

**Author's Note:**

> The prompt was 'link'. By sheer coincidence the recycled challenge in this round was 'reckless' which I also used. Two prompts with one story. Go me.

There were evenings Blair found it too hard to go out into the living area. He’d sit in his room, sorting out the boxes of books and papers, pretending that it was important when it was only something for his hands to do out of sight of Jim. Jim would lean into the room occasionally, murmur a question or two, but he never crossed the threshold with his feet.

Jim had been pretty quiet the last week. Well, so had Blair, when he wasn’t babbling trivia over meals and TV football games like an idiot. The words “yes” or “no” to the offer of working with Jim hadn’t been among the babble. Jim hadn’t questioned this omission yet, he was giving Blair his space in more ways than one; but Blair knew an answer was due, and he stood strung between options like a man frozen with fear on a high wire.

When he stood in front of those TV cameras Blair had assumed that he’d go, that he’d run, because that was what frauds did, and he’d been one hell of a fraud for too long. Making promises to Jim that he ultimately couldn’t keep. Telling himself that everything was about his study, and only that, not the man that he’d damningly identified all over his draft dissertation because it gave Blair a stupid thrill to see the name. If he stayed, he’d have to stay under Jim’s eye, and Jim was good at ignoring what he didn’t want to see, but if he couldn’t see that Blair’s press conference was as much Blair’s act of desperate need as it was selfless altruism, if he _refused_ to see that…

It would be easier if Blair never had to guess whether or not Jim chose to see and not act, or simply didn’t see, and Blair had assumed that he didn’t have any choices that would let him stay after he repudiated his work. Never assume. _It makes an Ass out of U and Me_ a poster in his high school homeroom used to say. Blair had blind-sided Jim with hit and run sacrifice, but he’d been a fool to think that Jim couldn’t return the favour.

But he did have choices, including a choice that meant he could stay with Jim, work with him day-to-day, stay in his home. It would mean being a cop, and taking on a fight with both Rainier and Berkshire that Blair had _assumed_ he’d abandon, but Blair could do that. He could do well-nigh anything for Jim Ellison, anything at all - except be sure that he could look Jim in the face if Jim figured Blair’s deepest feelings out. So he should run, except that meant losing Jim. So he should stay, go, stay, caught between those two points and starting to wobble.

“Hey, Chief.” Jim at the door again, being kind. “Can I come in?” This was new, and not entirely welcome.

Blair ignored the little bounce of terror in his chest and said, “Sure, man. Your home.”

“Your home too,” Jim said, and Blair’s eyes burned shamefully. Jim always did apology well, best friend, best cop, unpacking Blair’s boxes without a word after Alex. Blair swallowed, hideously aware of how his own apology for indiscretion and folly had revealed far too much. Anything for Jim except to ask him for that one last thing that would change the balance.

There wasn’t a lot of room inside Blair’s little space. There never had been and the stacks of boxes and scattered books and papers didn’t improve matters. Jim contemplated the disorder and then sat carefully beside Blair on the bed. There wasn’t a lot of room there either.

“I think we need to talk. I think we should have talked a while ago now.”

Blair shrugged. “Yeah, I know, I should have let you know what was going on a lot earlier-“

Jim gently broke in. “I was thinking more Alex. Incacha and his people. Maybe even when I let you extend that one week, way back when.”

“Twenty/twenty hindsight. It’s a beautiful thing.”

“Yeah.” Jim leaned forward, briefly covering his face with his hands, wiping them down his face in a gesture that Blair knew well. “Look, Chief. Blair. I can be blind and I can be stupid, but not even I can be both of them forever.”

“You’re sure you’re not underestimating yourself?” Blair asked with reckless flippancy. Everything was twisting under his feet, but Jim didn’t seem to notice.

He gave Blair a sweet, tired smile. “I hope not.” He shook his head. “We can’t go on like this. I can’t anyway. I don’t care if you don’t want to be a cop, but I want one thing very clear. I do care if you’re not around. I want you where I can see you.” There was a rising, passionate edge to Jim’s voice, which he tried to undercut. “God knows you get into enough trouble as it is.” His mouth gaped in horror. “Oh my god. I didn’t mean that how it sounded, I swear.”

“I hope not, Jim, given I get in as much trouble on your account as I do on my own. And, fuck, I didn’t mean that how it came out either. God.”

They stared at each other uncertainly. “I can be a cop,” Blair blurted. “If that’s the only option.”

“But it shouldn’t be the only option. It’s not.”

“Name one. That works for you, I mean. That keeps me where you can see me. Where I can see you.”

“That’s the question, isn’t it? I don’t know. I just don’t want to come home one day and find you gone.” Jim’s hand moved helplessly, hopelessly, and then it swooped into Blair’s space and grabbed his hand.

It was like a wind roaring in Blair’s ears. Jim knows, he thought, but that’s okay, because I know now too, no more blind or stupid for either of us - and what are we going to do with this mess? The first thing he was going to do was interlace his fingers with Jim’s and grip tight because he knew that Jim was just as unbalanced, just as scared as Blair. Could they edge back to safety, or were they going to topple over together?

Either way, Blair knew he wasn’t giving up Jim’s hand, the fingers linked in his, not one damn thing about Jim Ellison. Double act on the high wire, or nothing at all.


End file.
